


All Those Sweet Kisses

by Gildedmuse



Category: Rent (2005), Rent - Larson
Genre: Angst, Canonical Character Death, Drug Use, F/M, First Kiss, HIV/AIDS, Implied/Referenced Suicide, Jealousy, Kissing, M/M, One Shot, Pre-Canon, Sexual Tension, Voyeurism
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-04
Updated: 2019-05-04
Packaged: 2020-02-18 14:06:49
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,077
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18701131
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Gildedmuse/pseuds/Gildedmuse
Summary: April wonders about Mark and Roger's kissing habits.





	All Those Sweet Kisses

**Author's Note:**

> [Originally posted to LJ 2006]

**All Those Sweet Kisses**

  
  
April laughs the first time Mark and Roger kiss.  
  
Don't think she's some horrible girlfriend. She and Roger don't screw around. They might use and tease and scream, but they don't cheat. Threesomes aren't part of their sex life, no matter what some of his more desperate groupies might hope and whisper about when they think April can't hear them. No, there is nothing amusing about cheating.  
  
It's just that it's not cheating. No, it's just Mark. Safe, sensible Mark. Mark who is head over heels in love with Maureen and would do anything the woman asked. No one worries about Mark cheating on Maureen. No one really worries about Mark at all.   
  
They're all slightly drunk, slightly high. Mark more drunk than them. Roger and April higher. They're all out of it, though, when it happens, and April is sitting right there laughing about it. So it's not cheating.  
  
Besides, it's kinda cute. Not in the classical puppy and kittens and babies way, but still cute. How had it started? Mark said something, something about one of Roger's guy fans. Something like, "Doesn't it kinda weird you out? Having guys screaming at you like that?"  
  
April had laughed then, too. Her and Roger, they laughed at this fresh-faced kid from Brown University. "Why would it freak him out?" April asks, taking a drag from their heroin joint before passing it to Roger. Easier than shooting up. Safer, too, and her and Roger are always safe. About sex. About drugs. April isn't an idiot.   
  
All wide-eyed and young, Mark says, "I just wondered. It seems stupid, to me. Why would he like you? He's gotta know you're straight." This little comment gets more laughter from April and Roger.  
  
Roger leans forward, all wicked lips and glowing eyes, the way he always is when he gets like this. "You sure about that?" Then, because they're intoxicated and friends and just playing around, Roger kisses Mark.  
  
Roger kisses Mark, and April laughs. It's cute to see Mark's eyes go almost comically huge. Funny to see Roger grab his shoulders, steadying him but not catching the beer bottle that falls to the floor, splashing at April's feet. Mark kisses back, clumsy and swaying and with his cheeks turning bright pink. No, they aren't puppies or kittens or babies but it's pretty cute.  
  
The boys come apart with a wet smack. Roger's still smiling that evil smile of his. Mark looks lost and confused; the same look he'd worn when they'd first picked him up off the streets of Alphabet City wandering around looking for some place to stay. He opens and closes his mouth a few times, unable to get anything out.  
  
Still giggling, April asks, "What did you do to him now, Roger?"  
  
Then they all laugh. Comfortable, normal, friends. That is the first time.  
  
*  
  
The second time doesn't come for a while.  
  
In the bathroom of the Pyramid Club, Roger has her pushed against the stall. April is grinding against his thigh, moaning his name, fingers cramped in his hair. She's riding his thigh, moaning... and not getting a reaction. She could have been fucking another man right then, Roger wouldn't have noticed her. He's too busy tightening the belt around her arm. He has a needle clenched in his teeth. A needle given to him by The Man, as a reward two weeks ago for his first CBGBs gig. When he finally has the belt on, cutting off the blood flow and pinching at her skin, Roger spits out the needle. April tries to kiss him but he's too busy trying to find a vein. "You're going to love this," he promises. He's been begging her to try it since he'd first done it. Tonight, after watching him grinding and singing on stage, April would have said yes to anything.  
  
She winces when he presses the needle point into her skin, saying, "It will fucking blow you away." Then Roger goes to his knees, bunching her skirt around her waist and it's hard to say what blows her away more, the sex or the drugs, but she knows she'll be doing this again.  
  
They leave the bathroom forty minutes later smelling like sex and wearing identical, wicked grins.  
  
Mark steps out of the crowd, his trusty camera tucked under an arm. He smiles, looking between them, and even in her hazy state, April can tell he knows.  
  
Still, he laughs and asks, "Where have /you/ been?"  
  
This is five months after the first kiss. Five months since that little drunken spit exchange that had just been a joke between friends. Yeah, April hadn't even thought about it since then. That had just been three new roommates joking around a little, high and drunk and not meaning anything.  
  
That was five months ago, and this is now.  
  
Roger leans forward, grabbing Mark's chin and kissing him fierce and hard, right there in the middle of the club where anyone could see. This doesn't feel like a friendly, jesting kiss. Because it's not just between them. This is out in the open, with hundreds of people around and Mark and Roger are standing there kissing like there is no one else in the world. That's when April starts to wonder. She hadn't been thinking about the first kiss. Hadn't even crossed her mind. But that didn't mean they couldn't be thinking about it. That didn't mean Roger...  
  
There is no laughter this time when they pull apart. Only Mark looking flushed and breathless.  
  
Roger smiles. It's the same smile as always. That wicked guitarist smile that makes April wet whenever he flashes it. She wants to slap it off his face, but her limbs feel boneless and heavy and she's too shocked to move. Roger smiles and asks, "What's it taste like we've been doing?"  
  
Mark's expression collapses. "Fuck!" He yelps, running his hand over his mouth and spitting. "Roger, that's disgusting!"  
  
Finally there it is, that laughter that makes the kiss mean nothing. Deep and low, like a part of a song, and Roger is flicking at Mark's camera lens. "You're the one who asked."  
  
Mark is still trying to get the taste of Roger and April out of his mouth. Like they're moldy cheese or poison. "I didn't expect..." Mark trails off, not sure what he expected. Probably not for Roger to lean in and kiss him like that, but Mark hadn't pulled away. He didn't even complain about the kiss, really.  
  
Watching the two boys laugh over it like it's nothing, April starts to wonder. She hadn't thought about that first kiss, but that doesn't mean...  
  
*  
  
The third time isn't exactly the charm. If anything it's a setback, but that's what April wants, and she always gets what she wants.  
  
They're at the club, dancing to some club music Roger claims to hate but puts up with anyway, just for their sake. This is less than two months later, and April doesn't even remember most of that night. She does know that Roger and Mark have become good friends, great friends even, maybe closer than her and Roger. Well, that makes sense. Her and Roger aren't friends. They're lovers. Her and Roger fuck and Mark and Roger talk. Lovers and friends are two entirely different things.  
  
Still, April can't shake the feeling that something is wrong with this picture. This picture is not her and Roger grinding together, all but fucking on the dance floor. This picture is her and Roger and Mark dancing, none of them too close but all together and laughing just like friends should. Only more and more, there has been less grinding, more laughing. April doesn't like this. She likes being Roger's everything, Roger's life.  
  
"My own drug," he told her once, and even if they have plenty of other supplements for that, April knows what he meant.   
  
April loves it that way. Being the light that Roger follows. His muse. His girl. She is above everything, everyone else in Roger's life. That is how it is supposed to be between lovers. She is first and everyone else falls behind her in some random, unimportant pattern.  
  
Then Roger does something to set her off. It's the smallest thing. He hooks an arm around her shoulder, and this is fine. She sighs, snuggles into him, and he laughs just a bit before doing the same to Mark. The same exact fucking thing. Like her and Mark are both the love of his life or his best friend, but not different. That is what April had going for her even after Mark showed up with his stupid camera. She had always been just a little higher, because she is the girlfriend.  
  
Then Roger had to go and fuck that up.  
  
April reacts on instinct. She leans in, grabbing Roger and kissing him so hard that for once he'd be the one with bruised lips. Roger's hands, both of them, they go around her waist when she does this. Yes, he knows she's still the one, but this isn't quite enough. He really needs to know she's the only one.  
  
When she pulls back, Roger's eyes are dark. High without being high. Drunk on nothing more than cheap beer and bad music. The intoxication helps, give April an excuse for nodding towards Mark who is now standing at the sidelines. She wonders then if Mark wants to be her, if Roger wants her to be him. She wonders a lot of things, most of them hazy and half complete and jumbled by the alcohol. That's why when she pulls away from Roger, she grabs a handful of Mark's shift and yanks him towards them. That's why she whispers, "Kiss him."   
  
The worst part is watching them follow orders. Roger, Mark, they don't even question her. Just lean in and kiss one another. Softer than April's kiss. Softer and deeper, exploring each other mouths and closing off the world even though April is right there with her hands curled in both of their shirts, holding them together, eventually ripping them apart. There is nothing cute about this kiss.  
  
Then April grabs Mark's hand and shoves it down the front of her skirt. She can feel fingers, softer than what she's use to, curl under her panties. She looks right at Roger, doesn't care what Mark thinks about having his hand forced down there. "I want Mark to fuck me."  
  
She says it, makes it sound as honest as she can. "I want him to fuck me, Roger. Want him to fuck me while I suck you off. Watching him pound into me again and again. Please, Roger?"  
  
Mark may be the best friend, but April is the lover. She knows how possessives Roger can be. How quick he is to get jealous. The way those green eyes burn the second the words leave her mouth, she knows she's going to get what she wants. She can already see the thoughts forming in his head. Wondering why April wants this with Mark so badly. Wondering if maybe he'd missed something, if his best friend and girlfriend had been fucking around behind his back.  
  
Insecure, possessive, and completely owned by April.  
  
Roger is growling, "No," even as Mark is whimpering, "Yes." Then his hand is ripped out of April's skirt and Roger has her tucked under his arm. Her and her only.  
  
He tells a very shocked Mark to fuck off, and right now Mark doesn't even look like he's in the best friend position.  
  
This time, April laughs.  
  
*  
  
It may be the fourth time. It maybe the four hundredth time, but it's that kiss that does it.  
  
April walks back to the apartment on autopilot. She's so small now. Smaller than she's ever been. Skinny and stretched out. Thinning hair, dark circles under her eyes. A junkie, through and through. Roger still thinks she's sexy, though. Roger still shouts her name while he's fucking her, and that's all that matters. So long as Roger loves her, she's fine.  
  
 _We're sorry to inform you..._  
  
Sure, they had a rough spot in there. April got jealous of Mark, which had been stupid. The thing with Mark had been her fault, to say the least. Roger hadn't really had a friend before, and maybe he fucked up and thought that feeling of trust and friendship had been something deeper, but it hadn't. April messed with them a little, but hell; the boys had come out stronger for it. There had been that time she's fucked the Man for a few hits, and that had really set Roger off, but they'd gotten their smack and their make-up sex so what did it matter?  
  
So long as Roger and she loved each other, it didn't matter what the rest of the world threw at them. April clutches the note in her hands. She'd believed that through everything else, and she could believe that through this. As long as Roger loves her, April is the strongest woman alive.   
  
 _...virus might be present in your system. We recommend..._  
  
As long as April had Roger to love her, to hold her, she could make it through anything. As long as she is only his, then nothing else mattered. They've been through so much, and Roger has never given her any reason to doubt him. Not once. So what has April got to fear?  
  
Are they that strong? What if Roger couldn't... What if he doesn't... After this...  
  
 _...virus might be present..._  
  
She's shaking so hard she misses the first few steps up to the loft. Once Roger sees this, once he understands, once he holds her and tells her everything is alright then it will be.  
  
April slips inside the loft. She doesn't want anyone to hear or see her. She wants to talk to Roger before she talks to another living soul. This is her first mistake. Quiet as a mouse, she opens the door and tiptoes against the quickly crowding loft towards their bedroom.  
  
"-anything special."  
  
April stops just short of the door. Mark's voice coming for their room. The door is partly opened, so it's not like they're doing something they shouldn't. Still, April hates him. She needs her Roger, her Roger alone to understand and hold her. But no, Mark is there. Mark, the best friend. Mark, who never wants to talk about anything expect with her fucking boyfriend. Then he can stay up all night chatting and giggling and keeping Roger out of bed with her.  
  
"She's fucked in the head." Roger's soft, comforting voice. April cheeks feel hot and wet. That's the voice that needs to be hers right now, talking to her, promising to love her regardless. "You're amazing, Mark. Maureen's just..."  
  
"I don't know, Roger. I have to be doing something wrong." Girl problems. Mark is in there talking about girl problems, like that's the biggest fucking thing in their lives. April just wants him to leave. Just wants to curl up next to Roger. She looks through the door at the man she loves, laying on his side across from Mark. Just needs to here him say it, that she's his Only, and everything will be okay.  
  
Roger's hand runs through Mark's hair, down his neck and side. "Mark, what's it going to take before I convince you that you're worth more than that?"  
  
Just needs Roger to love her, and nothing else will matter.  
  
It's almost cute. Seeing two nervous boys' reach for each other. Almost cute how Mark is shaking when he runs a hand through Roger's hair and scoots across the bed, bodies melting together. Little moans, whimpers, the smack of wet lips. They're so scared of one another, of what they're doing, and there is something precious about their love.  
  
April chokes backs a sob. She backs away from the door, silent as a mouse, letting then have this moment.  
  
 _...positive...._  
  
Only Roger. That's all she asked. Just for one man to love her. Just for one person to be there through this. She can't seem to stop walking backwards. She steps back, and back, and back until she bumps into the counter of the bathroom.   
  
 _We're sorry to inform you that your blood... positive..._  
  
A slight bump, and she's knocked out of her backwards progression. She turns, bright eyes shimmering with silent tears running across her cheeks and lips and dying at her shirt. Looks down at the sink and can see Mark's hand in Roger's hair, the toothbrushes and their lips moving against one another, the razor and their bodies pressed together.  
  
The razor.  
  
*  
  
April isn't around to see the final kiss.  
  
Roger is sitting on his bed, staring at the note. It's wrinkled, wet from tears, torn in two and tapped back together.  
  
 _We have AIDs  
  
I'm not sorry._  
  
The room only stopped spinning an hour ago. Coming down from his latest withdrawal. Mark tried to hide the note from him. Not when they first found her body swimming in a red tinted bath. Not when Mark threw it in his face a month ago, telling Roger that if he didn't give up the smack this would happen to him. No, just last week. When he found Roger lying in bed, the note at his side, the needle laid out on top of it.  
  
Withdrawal. Relapse. Withdrawal. Relapse. Roger couldn't help it. He once told April she was his drug, better than heroin. Mark doesn't understand that he can sweat and shake and cry the drug from his system, but it will always be there. In him. Polluting his blood. He doesn't want to lose April.  
  
Soft footsteps. Soft footsteps and the click... click... click... of a camera. Not that Roger needs any more clues. No one but Mark comes near him anymore.  
  
The mattress dips, but Roger doesn't look up from the note.  
  
 _We have AIDs._  
  
Roger has AIDs. April has a plot in the local cemetery.  
  
 _I'm not sorry._  
  
"Rog?" Soft voice. Scared, too. Who knows what mood the faded, destroyed, dead rock star will be in this time around. Maureen, Benny, fuck even Collins tiptoe around him. Whisper.  
  
Mark tiptoes, too, but never whispers.   
  
"Roger? Have you... Have you taken the pills? You know, you need to."  
  
 _We have AIDs._  
  
How many times can a note hurt before it becomes just words?  
  
Soft hands running over his shoulder. Roger flinches but doesn't look up. No touching. Not anymore. He lost that right when he got mixed up with needles. When he killed April.  
  
 _I'm not sorry._  
  
How could he do this to her? To his baby? To the only girl who had stuck around no matter how fucked up he got? To the girl who had been his muse, his light, his everything? And he killed her.  
  
"You're going to love this," he said, and then he killed her.  
  
Soft movements on the bed as Mark scoots closer, caution but determined. "We're all really worried about you. You can't stay like this forever, Roger."  
  
Roger stares at the note. The words become letters. The letters become shapes. The shapes become pictures without meaning, swimming around Roger's head until they find memories to attach to. Watching April dancing in the front row of his show. He killed her. That smile she gave him after she came. He killed her. Her little drunk laugh with that gleam in her eyes when she got a dangerous thought. He killed her.  
  
Soft fabric brushing against his arm when Mark presses closer still. "Roger.... I... It's not the end of the word." Roger reads the note again. Again. Again. Again. It still hurts, but it doesn't make sense. Not to him. He can't have AIDs. He can't have AIDs. He can't have left his girlfriend for dead, bleeding in the tub with her eyes rolled back and lips parted in a silent scream. That's not what this note means. It can't. Nothing can fucking hurt that much. "We still care about you. I still..."  
  
Soft lips brushing against his. Real, not the dream lips of a girl whose skin is cold to the touch and whose arms are sliced open. Real and warm and soft.  
  
Roger finally moves. He takes a swing, and Mark hits the floor with a cry.  
  
"Don't. Touch. Me."  
  
Mark drags himself back to his feet, pale skin already bruising where Roger had punched him. He looks too confused to be hurt, but Roger knows what that is like and knows it won't last too long before everything sinks in and rips him apart. Good. He shouldn't be the only one in too much pain to comprehend. Let someone else suffer, even if it's just a little bit. "What was that for?" He asks, like he doesn't already know. Like he needs Roger to say the words to make it final. Giving him a chance to back out and apologize.  
  
Roger growls, rubbing his fist. "Don't you ever kiss me again."  
  
There is a flash of something so familiar in those eyes. Something that hurts so much it shouldn't have a name. Good, Roger thinks. Keep it coming. "I was just trying to-"  
  
"I don't care!" Roger wishes he could take another hit at Mark. And another. He doesn't even know why. He isn't even that upset with Mark. He just wants someone to pay for his mistakes. For the murder that is on his hands. "You think you can just kiss it better?"  
  
 _We have AIDs._  
  
I'm not sorry.  
  
"Roger, calm down." Soft voice, trying to convince him to be rational. Roger's never been rational. Never been calm. Roger is dying and wants to be dead already, so a little thing like friendship isn't going to stop him from screaming at Mark.  
  
Roger sits back on the bed, curling his legs against his chest, staring down at that little sheet up paper that ruined his life. "I'll never love anyone," he mutters. He shakes. He hates. "I don't deserve to love anyone."  
  
"Don't say that." Mark doesn't sound convincing, and that's how Roger knows it's true. He really doesn't deserve to love anyone ever again. How could he, after April?  
  
"I'm never going to love anyone the way I loved her." This is fucked up. He should be out of tears already. He's never cried this much in his life. He probably doesn't deserve to.  
  
Soft hands against his shoulder, trying to get through and warm Roger's blood back into life. It's too late for that though. He's poison. Roger jerks away again. He's trained himself to back away from any touch. "Don't touch me," he repeats. "No touching. No kissing."  
  
"Roger-"  
  
"Whatever we did before," Roger says. "I was messed up. Drugs. Sex. I have to stop it all. I don't want you Mark. I just want April, and I fucked that up." He's not sure who he is trying to hurt.  
  
"I'm not going to give up being your friend," Mark says, and Roger knows he doesn't deserve that, but he can't seem to make the other boy realize this. So he just slumps over the note, still and quiet.  
  
This won't be Roger's last withdrawal. No, they still have months of that. Roger shaking and sweating and clawing at the walls trying to get one last hit, but they'd get over that. Mark would make sure that Roger stayed healthy, that they got through this. He would take away the needles and smack and razors - fuck, they had to hide anything sharp that might give Roger ideas - but they got through it. It wouldn't be the last time Roger fell in love. No, there would be a bright-eyed junkie who would strut into their lives and Roger would find himself not alone for what felt like the first time in ages. That night wouldn't mean anything. It was just Roger rambling from withdrawal, from a broken heart, from death hanging over his head. That's all.  
  
"I don't love you like that, Mark," Roger mutters, rocking back and fourth and staring at April's note like more words will appear, some sort of explanation for why she'd left him like this. Would it have been so hard to try this together? "I need April."  
  
"I know," Mark replies. Dead. Determined. "You're going to get through this, Roger. We're going to get through this."  
  
It's just the last time they kiss.


End file.
